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Hot-Electrons in Multilayer Graphene Revisited
No full textsponsorship: G.F. acknowledges financial support from the MIUR - PRIN grant in the frame of the aSTAR project (2017RKWTMY_003). Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore supported this work through D.3.1 and D.2.2 grants. (Universit? Cattolica del Sacro Cuore|2017RKWTMY_003, MIUR - PRIN grant in the frame of the aSTAR project|D.3.1, MIUR - PRIN grant in the frame of the aSTAR project|D.2.2, Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore)status: Publishe
The ADHventures of Asterix and Copeptin: The Hyponatraemia Challenge
No full textstatus: Published onlin
Semantic similarity among autobiographical memories is associated with rumination.
No full textsponsorship: Keisuke Takano was supported by Humboldt Research Fellowship for Postdoctoral Researchers of the Alexander von Humboldt foundation. Filip Raes was supported by the KU Leuven Research Council grant PF/10/005. Filip Raes and Keisuke Takano received additional support from a Red Noses grant of the Research Foundation - Flanders (FWO-Vlaan-deren; G0F5617N) . (Humboldt Research Fellowship for Postdoctoral Researchers of the Alexander von Humboldt foundation, KU Leuven Research Council|PF/10/005, KU Leuven Research Council|G0F5617N)status: Publishe
Multimodale Beeldvormingsintelligentie voor Combinatorische Screening
No full textDeveloping new drugs is a slow, costly process, often taking 12 to 15 years and billions of dollars. This research aims to speed up drug discovery by improving how we test drug com pounds on cell models, e.g., organoids, spheroids, and other cell clusters. A major challenge in drug testing is combinatorial screening, which tests from thousands of drug compounds to millions of combinations at once. This is a major time-consuming process in drug discovery. For 10k–100k compounds, the data acquisition only can take days.
This study introduces two advanced imaging techniques—Lens-Free Imaging (LFI) and Electrical Impedance Tomography (EIT)—which work together to produce real-time, large-scale images that reveal both the structure and function of samples. The novel LFI-EIT multimodal imaging platform has the potential to replace conventional brightfield-fluorescent microscopy in biomedical use.
The main objectives are to make LFI faster for image reconstruction, combine it with EIT for more detailed data, and create an automated system for quicker processing. Key contributions include a new imaging framework for wide-field, real-time views, deep learning models for more accurate image reconstruction, and a system that speeds up analysis. This research aims to make drug testing faster and more informative, ultimately helping to accelerate drug development, especially for diseases that vary among patients. Besides this, we also proposed a sparse neural network for improving EIT reconstruction.
As a result, the image capture region (i.e., field of view) can be expanded 20× larger than conventional light microscopes, with sub-pixel resolution. Furthermore, it has the potential to support large-scale microfluidics in such a large region. By integrating these systems, the overall drug screening is expected to be approximately 70-90% shorter. Lastly, the EIT add-on can help the system monitor samples' inner physiological processes faster and more accurately than using toxic fluorescent biomarkers.status: Publishe
Development of a Microwave-Susceptible Heterogeneous Catalyst for the Super Dry Reforming Process
No full textstatus: Publishe
Klonale Heterogeniteit en Evolutie Tijdens Behandeling in Pediatrische Acute Lymfatische Leukemie - Een Single-Cell Karakterisatie
No full textAcute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) represents the most common pediatric cancer, arising from the stepwise accumulation of mutations in developing B cells (B-ALL) or T cells (T-ALL). Despite significant improvements in the outcome of patients with ALL over the past few decades, relapse still occurs in approximately 10%-15% of patients and is associated with a poor prognosis. Previous single-cell DNA sequencing (scDNA-seq) in B-ALL cases demonstrated a particularly high degree of subclonal heterogeneity in high hyperdiploid (HeH) B-ALL. HeH B-ALL represents the most common subtype of pediatric B-ALL, and although it is generally associated with a good prognosis, it also accounts for the largest absolute number of relapses. We aimed to assess whether a higher degree of clonal heterogeneity at diagnosis could be associated to subsequent development of therapy resistance or relapse.
In the first part of this thesis, we aimed to extensively characterize the subclonal complexity of HeH B-ALL at diagnosis and during treatment. We performed targeted scDNA-seq using our custom amplicon panel in 13 HeH B-ALL patients, which identified RAS (KRAS/NRAS) mutations that were acquired in parallel and occurring mutually exclusive in all cases. Moreover, single-cell analysis demonstrated that chromosomal copy number changes were mostly stable and early events, whereas point mutations, including RAS mutations, were usually subclonal and late events. ScDNA-seq could also aid in the detection of measurable residual disease (MRD) in bone marrow samples at early treatment phases.
In the second part of this thesis, we examined the clonal evolution patterns in 9 diagnosis-relapse pairs of patients with HeH B-ALL at single-cell level. Although RAS mutations were omnipresent at diagnosis, they were present in the dominant relapse clone in only half of the cases. This observation suggested that RAS mutations are not the main drivers of relapse in HeH B-ALL. We did, however, observe a trend of a higher degree of clonal heterogeneity at diagnosis in patients that relapsed as compared to those that did not. Additionally, in cases of patients with other B-ALL subtypes that relapsed with a CD19-negative B-ALL following anti-CD19 chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy, profiling of the surface proteins at single-cell level could track CD19-negative populations before and after relapse following CAR T-cell therapy.
In the last part of this thesis, we present a case series of 4 patients with B-ALL that experienced CD22-positive relapse following anti-CD19 CAR T-cell therapy. All patients received inotuzumab ozogamicin, a CD22-targeting antibody conjugated to the cytotoxic agent calicheamicin, and were successfully brought into remission to subsequently receive allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. This illustrates the potential of a personalized treatment approach in these heavily pretreated patients.
In conclusion, single-cell analysis characterized the clonal heterogeneity in patients with HeH B-ALL at diagnosis, during treatment and at relapse. Despite the limited cohort size, our findings offer novel insights into the clonal architecture and evolution of HeH B-ALL and lays the groundwork for future research aimed at enhancing risk stratification and clinical outcomes in affected children.status: Publishe
La construcción absoluta y su aproximación desde la Gramática de Construcciones Diacrónica: un estudio en las traducciones del latín al español (pre)clásico y moderno
No full textstatus: Published onlin
Community challenge towards consensus on characterization of biological tissue: C4Bio's first results
No full textThis study investigates methodological variability across various expert laboratories worldwide, with regards to characterizing the mechanical properties of biological tissues. Two testing rounds were conducted on the specific use case of uniaxial tensile testing of porcine aorta. In the first round, 24 labs were invited to apply their established methods to assess inter-laboratory variability. This revealed significant methodological diversity and associated variability in the stress–stretch results, underscoring the necessity for a standardized approach.
In the second round, a consensus protocol was collaboratively developed and adopted by 19 labs in an attempt to minimize variability. This involved standardized sample preparation and uniformity in testing protocol, including the use of a common cutting and thickness measurement tool. Despite protocol harmonization, significant variability persisted across labs, which could not be solely attributed to inherent biological differences in tissue samples.
These results illustrate the challenges in unifying testing methods across different research settings, underlining the necessity for further refinement of testing practices. Enhancing consistency in biomechanical experiments is pivotal when comparing results across studies, as well as when using the resulting material properties for in silico simulations in medical research.sponsorship: The authors would like to thank the Avicenna Alliance, Belgium and VPH Institute for their financial support, as well as KU Leuven, Belgium (OPSTAMET C2M/24/031 and KERNFAC FIBER) and the Research Foundation-Flanders, Belgium (I011822N and G0H1116N) . Furthermore, we wish to acknowledge the efforts of the staff of FIBEr, KU Leuven core facility, specifically Adriana Wilmots Helsen, Markos Kapeliotis and Wouter Willekens, for procuring, preparing and shipping all samples. Next, we would like to express our gratitude to Eddy Smets and Thomas Pilkington, from the Mechanical workshop and Fablab-Leuven respectively, within the department of Mechanical Engineering, for their assistance in the development of cutting and thickness measurement tool used in test round 2.We would also like to thank all the members of the Tissue Characterization Task Force of the Avicenna Alliance for their support. Finally, we would like to thank the following researchers for their contribution to the conception of C4Bio, to the mechanical testing and/or to the data-analysis:Dr. Ir. Klaas Vander Linden, KU LeuvenDr. Kris Bogaerts, KU Leuven Ir. Thibault Vervenne, KU LeuvenIr. Matijs Loeckx, KU LeuvenDr. Alex Caulk, MedtronicDr. Markus Reiterer, MedtronicDr. Venkateswaran Perumal, StrykerDr. Raja Jayendiran, StrykerDr. Naveen Kumar Subramani, StrykerDr. Martin Tanaka, University of Western CarolinaDr. Connor Gains, Queen Mary University of London (Avicenna Alliance, Belgium, VPH Institute, KU Leuven, Belgium|OPSTAMET C2M/24/031, Research Foundation-Flanders, Belgium|I011822N, Research Foundation-Flanders, Belgium|G0H1116N)status: Publishe
A threats, support and hidden costs framework of coping with challenges to social identity
No full textsponsorship: This work was supported by an Odysseus grant from the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO) to Colette Van Laar [G.O.E66.14N], and fellowship grants from the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO) to Jenny Veldman [11A2418N] and Aster Van Rossum [1114222N]. Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek [Odysseus Grant G. O.E66.14N]; Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek [1114222N]; Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek [11A2418N]. (Research Foundation Flanders (FWO)|11A2418N, Research Foundation Flanders (FWO)|1114222N, Research Foundation Flanders (FWO)|G.O.E66.14N, Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek|11A2418N, Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek|1114222N, Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek|G. O.E66.14N)status: Published onlin
Row Reduction Techniques for n-Party Garbling
No full textRecent advancements in maliciously secure garbling have significantly improved the efficiency of constant-round multi-party computation. Research in the field has primarily focused on reducing communication complexity through row reduction techniques and improvements to the preprocessing phase with the use of simpler correlations. In this work, we present two contributions to reduce the communication complexity of state-of-the-art multi-party garbling with an arbitrary number of corruptions. First, we show how to achieve full row reduction for n-party garbled circuits in HSS17-style protocols (Hazay et al., Asiacrypt’17 & JC’20) and authenticated garbling (Yang et al., CCS’20), reducing the size of the garbled circuit by 25% from to and from to bits per AND gate, respectively. Achieving row reduction in multi-party garbling has been an open problem which was partly addressed by the work of Yang et al. for authenticated garbling. In our work, we show a full row reduction for both garbling approaches, thus addressing this open problem completely. Second, drawing inspiration from the work of Dittmer et al. (Crypto’22), we propose a new preprocessing protocol to obtain the required materials for the garbling phase using large field triples that can be generated with sublinear communication. The new preprocessing significantly reduces the communication overhead of garbled circuits. Our optimizations result in up to a 6 reduction in communication compared to HSS17 and a 2.2
reduction over the state of the art authenticated garbling of Yang et al. for 3 parties in a circuit with 10 million AND gates.sponsorship: Cybersecurity Research Flanders|VR20192203, FWO|GOH9718N, MOZAIK FWO|S003321Nstatus: Published onlin